


(I’m Trying Hard to Love You) You Don't Make It Easy, Babe

by runningscissors



Series: Like a Triptych [2]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Aurors, Battle of the Astronomy Tower (Harry Potter), Book 6: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Canon Compliant, Canonical Character Death, F/M, Marauders Friendship (Harry Potter), Multi-Era, Pottermore Compliant, Second War with Voldemort, Sexual Content, Weasley Family, dumbledore's funeral
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-18
Updated: 2020-06-18
Packaged: 2021-03-03 22:01:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,856
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24792778
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/runningscissors/pseuds/runningscissors
Summary: "He is bone-tired, but he doesn’t want to rest. He knows what he wants. He’s just not sure he’s brave enough to go after it."
Relationships: Remus Lupin/Nymphadora Tonks
Series: Like a Triptych [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1726633
Comments: 5
Kudos: 34





	(I’m Trying Hard to Love You) You Don't Make It Easy, Babe

**Author's Note:**

> Meant to follow [One Step Forward, Two Steps Back](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23950729) but can be read alone.

He finds her sat amongst the long grass. Back hunched, legs folded close to her chest. The knee of her jeans is ripped, there’s blood smeared along the tear. 

The sky is exploding with colour as the sun begins to crest over the trees. It paints the clouds like a sky on fire, a gradient of blues to orange to the brightest of pinks. The glow hits her like a cruel imitation of the way she _should_ look. There is no colour in her now. He’d been horrified when he’d first laid eyes on her — the pallid, gaunt look of her. If it hadn’t been for her Aurors robe, he’s not sure he’d have even recognized her. Oh, he’d certainly gotten an earful from Molly about _poor dear Tonks_ at Christmas, but he’d thought she’d exaggerated in a less-than-subtle guilt trip that he clearly deserved. Never would he have imagined that Molly had been so right. 

He takes a seat a few metres back and away from her and lets the breath he’s been holding go. He knows it’s up to him to break the silence, but he’s loathed to do so. If he does, then he’ll have to live with whatever happens next. His body has other ideas, though, and it’s the rattling cough he can’t hold back that breaks the quiet.  
  
“That sounds nasty,” she doesn’t look at him, her voice devoid of emotion. 

“Nothing I can’t manage,” he says, reaching into the pocket of his coat for his packet of cigarettes. Smoking, while not something he would consider a vice of his, had been useful underground and thus necessary. Fags could be used as currency in exchange for a word or two of information, an excuse for fresh air, a reason to step away without raising suspicion. It also helped to have something to occupy his hands when all he wanted was to reach for his wand. 

Barely forty-eight hours earlier, he’d been living in squalor with werewolves on the fringe of society. Now everything has changed.

“I didn’t think you smoked,” she says, head whipping back to look at him incredulously, nose wrinkling in distaste.   
  
He flicks ash away, examining the cigarette in his hand. “I don’t really. But it turns out they’re a bugger to quit in times of emotional distress.” 

“Emotional distress,” she laughs mirthlessly, staring out into the distance a moment, before turning back to him. The sound of her makes him wince. “Give us one then,” she says, sticking her hand out. He fumbles with his pack, careful not to touch her as he places one and the lighter in her palm, disappointed when she doesn’t try to touch him either. She splutters a little on the first inhale, cigarette poised between her nail-bitten fingers. It falls quiet again for a few moments as they both smoke in silence, before she pitches the rest to the ground, crushing it with the toe of her boot.  
  
“That didn’t make me feel any better,” she says, fiddling with his lighter, “just nauseous mainly. My grandad died of lung cancer.”  
  
“I’m sorry,” he replies, taking a final drag, smoke curling around them.  
  
“You’re always sorry,” she mutters, “Remus Lupin, the eternal apologist.” 

He doesn’t respond. He knows she wants him to bite, but he won’t row with her again. He doesn’t have it in him, not now after all that’s happened these past few hours. She continues to fidget with the lighter, and when a spark catches, she yelps in pain, dropping the lighter and mouthing at her thumb to soothe the burn.

“Dora—” he begins, but the words dry up when she turns back to look at him. There are storm clouds in her eyes, dark and threatening. Clouds of hurt, of heartbreak, of anger. 

“Don’t.” Her voice cracks like lightning through the air, and he flinches. 

He pauses, his eyes flickering around her wan face and sunken cheeks, “Nymphadora, look at you, your _hair_ —”

“Oh please,” she scoffs, “don’t flatter yourself. You may think you’re the worst thing in my life, but I’m not _so_ pathetic that I’d let heartache get the best of me. I’ve spent months now fighting off _actual_ monsters. Dementors are no jolly picnic, you know, kind of takes it out of you after a while.”

“Yes, I’m aware,” he says tersely. “I know exactly what you’ve been facing up here.” 

“That’s nice,” she snaps, “I’m glad at least one of us had some peace of mind then because I can’t say the same. I have no bloody idea where you’ve been or what you’ve been doing. I’ve imagined you dead a hundred different ways this past year without a word from anyone about how you were.” Her voice breaks at the end, and something in him clenches. She turns back to the lake with a hard stare.

“All right, Remus,” she sighs now, scrubbing at her eyes. “Have it your way. I’m tired of fighting you. I shouldn’t have to beg someone to return my affection. Even I know I deserve more than that.” 

Of course, she deserves more than him, that has never been up for debate. It’s just that he’s beginning to question whether he cares quite so much about any of it anymore. Everyone keeps telling him things— that’s he’s wrong, that he’s being foolish, that the risk is worth it— even Minerva, whose policy has always been that cooler heads prevail, had told him to rush headlong into love. What could they all possibly see that he couldn’t… or wouldn’t perhaps? 

Tonks stands, grabbing his lighter from the ground and tosses it back to him, where he catches it with buttery fingers. 

“Maybe you love me. I’d been so sure of it once, but now…” she drifts off with a heartbreaking little shrug. “I don’t think you’ll ever love anyone more than you hate yourself.” 

He keeps his gaze down as she walks past him, back towards the castle. 

+

He stays at Hogwarts, unsure of how to be useful but desperate to do something, anything until eventually, Minerva sends him away. 

“Go rest, Remus.” She gives him a small, almost motherly pat to the shoulder, and he feels again like a schoolboy with his head of house teacher. “I’ve already told Aberforth to expect you.”

He is bone-tired, but he doesn’t want to rest. He knows what he wants. He’s just not sure he’s brave enough to go after it.  
  
Tonks is not in Hogsmeade when he gets there, called away to report back to the Ministry, so he waits outside the Aurors lodgings. It is an uncharacteristically sunny day, and he feels his eyes drooping the longer he stands with his back against the old, wooden siding; the sun leeching what little energy he has left with every passing minute. 

He straightens in alert to the sound of Apparition. 

“What are you doing here, werewolf?” An older man in Auror robes barks, his fingers twitching along the handle of his wand. A response Remus would have expected any Auror to have when finding a dishevelled dark creature snoozing on their doorstep. 

This was foolish. 

“Christ, Dawlish, could you be more of an arse?” He hears Tonks’ voice snap back, as she pushes around the three other Aurors to stand in front of him. “Remus,” she says in greeting, sounding as tired as he feels. 

“Hello Auror Tonks,” he responds hoarsely, warily eyeing the Auror glowering like he’d like nothing more than to blast Remus’ bollocks off. “Might I have a word with you?” 

Tonks rubs at her eye, “I’m just headed back to London, but I’m off duty so I can spare some time.” 

He can feel the eyes of all of Tonks colleagues on him, and Tonks quirks a brow at him in understanding. “I’ll be at the Hog’s Head.” She nods, and together the Aurors file in past him. When he gets to the Hog’s Head, the tavern is unlocked, but empty this early in the morning. He calls for Aberforth with no reply and sits at a table farthest from the windows. Twenty minutes later, Tonks blows in through the front door, her messenger bag slung over her shoulder and stuffed to the brim - parchment scrolls and the sleeve of a jumper looking to escape the opening.

With a wet sniff, she slides into the seat across him, dropping her bag beside her. “For someone who doesn’t want to be seen in public with me, that was fairly daft.”   
  
“I’m sorry if I caused any issues with your colleagues.” She waves him off, and they both fall silent.

"Where's Abe?" she asks, scanning the space. In answer, there is the soft, distant sound of something shattering and her face falls. He recognizes that sound, it's the sound of repressed grief bubbling to the surface in even the gruffest of men. They are not the only people to have lost someone last night. 

“What’s happening with the Order?” 

He notes the dirt and nicotine stains under his nails and pulls his hands back under the table to rest along his thighs. 

“I, uh— this isn’t about the Order. This is a personal call.” Tonks’ brows raise, but she gives no other acknowledgement. “What you said earlier— you _do_ deserve better.” He catches her eyes, these dark orbs that swallow her face. He has always liked her eyes; it was one of the first things that attracted him to her, he thinks. They are truly a window into her soul— unguarded and expressive to every emotion she feels. “You deserve everything.”

“But it’s not about what I deserve,” her lip trembles as she speaks. “It’s about what I want, and what I want is you.” 

He already knows she wants him; knows what it feels like to have those words whispered like the sweetest little secret in his ear. 

“Do you want me?” 

This past year, at his lowest points, he’d longed for nothing more than to catch a glimpse of her. Every flash of colour out the corner of his eye and his heart would seize, only for it to be nothing more than a trick, a masochistic mirage his mind had made. In a moment of madness, he’d even shamefully trailed a muggle woman in Newcastle for almost twenty-five minutes just so he could pretend. The pink colour wasn’t quite right, the length longer, her roots showing, but it hadn’t mattered. For just a minute, he could lose himself in fantasy, before returning to the waking nightmare that was his life. The spell had broken when she’d turned, and he was forced to reckon with what he’d been doing. It wasn’t the face he wanted.

Well, he doesn’t have to fantasize now. The face he’d longed for is flesh and blood before him, but he feels just as ashamed, just as disgusted with himself now as he did then. But he also feels awed, humbled by the heart she offers him time and time again.

“Yes,” the word rushes past his lips, immediate and emphatic. “Yes, Nymphadora, I want you.” Tonks lips part in surprise, a little ‘O,’ and her eyes go large as saucers. She reaches for him, her small, pale hand sliding across the tabletop, and he catches it with his own, pulling her fingers to his mouth to press a kiss to them. 

“I love you. So, if you still want me, I’m yours.”  
  
“I do,” she breathes, her eyes glassy with unshed tears. 

\+   


Remus follows Tonks to London, back to her little flat and her loud muggle neighbours. He follows, watching her back, the fall of her natural hair over her shoulders, longer than he’s ever seen her wear it. Wanting her so badly, it hurts.

He leaves a note for Aberforth and figures he’ll owl Molly about coming to pick up the trunk he’s stored in their attic as soon he has more sorted. All he knows right now is that he’s not going back underground. Any attempt to re-establish contact would be useless now that his cover is thoroughly blown. And even if it weren’t, he still wouldn’t go back. Without Dumbledore, the Order needs every member available and accessible. The altruistic part of him knows he’s of more use staying here, and the selfish part of him wants to revel in the love he has denied for too long, and the fizzing feeling enveloping him as Tonks fumbles with her keys, and he presses close behind her.

“I swear I’m not trying to suggest anything,” she calls behind her, kicking off her boots as they step through the front door. “But when was the last time you had a scrub?” 

Despite himself, he laughs. “I’m afraid to say it’s been some time. Hazards of living rough.” He goes for casual, desperate not to burst the heady bubble that has developed around them. Thankfully she doesn’t push for more, just smiles and offers him first go at the shower. He stands at her tiny bathroom sink and takes everything in. There are paint swatches taped all along her mirror, some boxes crossed out with a large X. The sight makes him grin and saddens him in equal measure, insight into the seemingly unending colour palette of Tonks’ hair, and the cruel reminder of what she’s lost. Then he catches his reflection, an antithesis to the colour surrounding him. Remus hasn’t seen his face in four months, and maybe that’s for the best— he’s not sure he would have ever been able to face Tonks knowing he looked the way he does. 

It doesn’t seem to hit until he’s in the shower, surrounded by the intoxicating citrusy scent he associates with her—satsuma body wash as it turns out— and suddenly he is crushed under the weight of his grief. _Oh God,_ Dumbledore is gone. Breath leaves him, broken and wrenching from his throat, as he sucks back the anguish that threatens to spill.

If only Sirius were here to see this now. Perversely, he can hear him crowing in triumph. Sirius had never trusted Severus, and he has now been proven right.

Remus had dismissed Harry’s concerns at Christmas, had laughed at his paranoia of Severus and Draco Malfoy in cahoots as simply fevered animosity. But Harry has proven time and again to have sharp instincts, and he should have listened. They all should have listened. Severus had fooled them all, even Dumbledore, it seems. None of it makes sense. Why would Severus turn now? Why was this the moment? 

Was he just ensuring that the deed was done when Draco couldn’t say the words or was there something else? Dumbledore had trusted Severus implicitly, that had to mean something. 

He could stand here all day and still not be clean, but he stays under the spray just long enough to get the worst of it off. Fresh clothes are waiting for him where his soiled ones had once been. An old jumper he’s seen Tonks wear before, and a pair of soft lounge pants. He can only assume she’s transfigured the pants to fit, but knowing Tonks' propensity for men’s clothing, maybe not. 

When he emerges, crudely shaven but clean, Tonks is in the kitchen, rifling through her cupboards. She’s changed into her usual uniform of jeans and a top with little straps that bare her shoulders and clavicle to him. She is thinner now, her arms more willowy than toned as they once were. 

Still lovely, though, and when she turns and smiles at him, she looks herself again. He is undone at the sight of her, his resolve crumbled under his desire to touch her. He reaches for her, and her hands twine into his hair as he braces his hands on the counter, leaning into her. She is the only thing keeping him from falling through the floor. His heart jumps into his throat at the suddenness of it, and he used what is left of his sense to throw himself into this moment entirely. He kisses her messily, wantonly, sliding his tongue in her mouth and tugging her closer to him, making the need better and worse at the same time. The kiss is bruising, and she holds him to her, locked to her mouth as if he would ever want to pull away. She gasps softly, rolling her head to the side and fisting his jumper in her hands as his lips brush her neck as he’s longed to do. When they part, he is struggling for breath, and she smiles again, eyes shyly cast downwards.

“I’ve never seen your toes before,” she murmurs, and he smiles too, lips brushing against hers once more as he sways further into her. Desperately, he touches her face, before bringing his hands back down to the countertop behind her. Not willing to give up the proximity, not just yet. Their foreheads come to rest together, and her hands press against his chest. 

He feels his heart racing and wonders if hers is too.

“I’m sorry, by the way,” she says softly, “about Dumbledore,” his chest constricts at the name, and she rubs comforting circles into him. “I know how important he was to you.” There’s a lump in his throat, and he tries to work around it. A small ‘ _thank-you’_ is all he can seem to get out. She gives him a little empathetic grin, then shifts to lay her head in the crook of his neck, and his breath hitches ever so slightly. 

“Dora, we should tal—” she stops him, pressing her fingers gently over his mouth. 

“Later,” she says firmly, then yawns. He smiles at the sight of it, noticing once more the heavy feeling of his eyes, and lets them slide shut as his cheek falls to rest against her. 

\+ 

Sex, he is quick to discover, is both the making and ruin of him. 

If he is unravelled at the merest touch of her, he all but implodes at the intimacy sex allows a touched starved addict such as himself. He is atomic at the feel of her hands, her mouth— Merlin’s _fucking knobby knees her wet, hot, eager mouth—_ which teases and envelopes him in equal measure as they exorcise their last encounter on her sofa. He tries to protest, but it’s shallow and halfhearted at best, and she pays him no mind as his back arched off the sofa cushions— his thoughts narrowed down to the feel of it, the squeeze and pull at his navel like Apparation, except he goes nowhere. Instead, he comes, hands brushing at her neck and ears buzzing with white noise as she rests her chin against his knee.  
  
“There,” Tonks says with a pleased little smile, tongue sweeping her bottom lip, and he groans at the sight, “maybe now you’ll get out of your head and enjoy yourself a little more.”

And enjoy himself, he does. 

Because she’s right, the anxiety is there; that he’ll be an inexperienced lover— which he is— an overstimulated teenager who pops off too quickly and embarrasses himself. Something excusable with youth, but quite pathetic when one is in their late thirties and well past their prime. But she doesn’t care, just smiles, eyes shining with love and desire for _him,_ and shows him what she wants, what she likes, what makes her pant, and curse, and throw her hands up to clutch at the spindles of her headboard. 

He finds new things to fall in love with — the parenthetic arch of her back as passion overtakes her; that breathy moan that’s been chasing him all year; the feel of her hands as they run the length of his body, making his skin hum with pleasure; the way she grins with her release, a wave of joy that swallows him whole. 

She even makes him like his name, the way she whispers it like it’s precious, the way that love forms the vowels on her lips. 

She is unabashed in her nakedness and by proxy makes him less ashamed of his, a previously unheard of thought. For the first time, he almost feels comfortable in his skin— soused on the feeling of being wanted, of being found sexually desirable just as he is— mottled, scarred patchwork that his skin is. 

After he watches Tonks from his spot in her bed, the sheets tangled around his hips. Watches her brush her teeth in nothing but her knickers, so seemingly comfortable in her own body that he is awash with wanting all over again. He watches her scrutinizes her reflection, brows furrowed in concentration, and the eruption of an elated gasp as she throws herself back onto the bed and into his arms. 

“Look!” She cries, tugging at her hair, which is now a mauvey tone, subtle by her standards but undoubtedly different from what it had been when she’d left the bed. 

“Oh, God Remus,” she snickers, face turned into his shoulder in amusement, “you’ve literally shagged the colour back into me. How’s that for prowess?” 

He can’t help but laugh at that. “I’ve never heard such rubbish,” he mumbles, embarrassment staining his cheeks as they dissolve into a giggling heap, rolling about the bed together. 

She tugs at the lobe of his ear with her lips, and he moans— guttural and low in his throat, heat crawling up his back as she pushes her body flush against him. 

“Want to try again for something brighter?” She practically purrs, leaning back to smile coyly at him, but it is unbearable to have her even a little farther from him. He feels his heartbeat below his waist in equal pressure and grips her thigh to drive her hips into him, pulling her close, and captures her mouth with his, reaching blindly for the intimacy so freely offered. 

Sex, such a basic, animalistic thing in some respects, makes him feel more human— _like a man_ — than maybe anything ever has. He will never recover from this, and it has doomed them both to think for even a moment that he is more man than beast. 

\+ 

He has found a new tantalizing and dangerous weakness, one maybe even more satisfying than touch— domesticity. These weaknesses work in tandem, devouring each other like an ouroboros, a potent concoction when mixed that he powerless to resist as he shifts back into the man he’d put on hold to go underground. 

He is enthralled with it; mornings of toast with jam and tea; dinners sat around her kitchen island— the first real meals he’s had since Christmas, which taste all the better for having Tonks skim her fingers along the waistband of his trousers as he stands at her stove— cocooned in a heady, clouded feeling that clings to all new lovers. The tinkle of canned laughter from her telly as she cuddles into his side on the sofa in the evening. 

Most of all, though, he is enthralled with her, more even than he was before, as the small details of who she is begin to fill in. He finds that Tonks hums absentmindedly to herself, a sweet, girlish sound which is unexpected. Her self-deprecating sense of humour that makes him shake his head and laugh in ways he hasn’t in years; the little noise of her smacking her lips when she wakes, not easily roused, kills him in the sweetest way. Tonks rings her parents to check-in, an unusual method of communication for a magical family, and something in him swells at the sight of her tangled in the telephone cord as she paces and talks— a lethal combination. He will never tire of listening to her— raucous stories of her tight-knit muggle family, the misadventures of her rambunctious youth, her time as a cadet— he lives vicariously in the stories of her happy childhood, her moody teenage years and marvels that two people who have lived such different lives could find one another. That she sees something in him worth loving is beyond his comprehension.

She has opened her world to him, allowed him to slip inside amongst her rolls of parchment, her assortment of tat and overflowing record collection, like a well-loved book upon her shelf. He feels a sense of calm here, of home— one he spent his whole adult life looking for. 

Slipping into bed to sleep with Tonks is undoubtedly the most casually intimate thing he has ever done. Tonks radiates heat, a side effect of being a metamorphmagus, she’d said with a shy little shrug at his first expansive touches, and he had practically melted into her skin. He wakes in the night, skin damp with sweat as he tries to peel away from where his chest and arms have fused to her skin. But he likes it, her heat like a balm to the permeant aches that dwell under his skin. Unaccustomed to sharing a bed, he’d worried that he would make a lousy bedfellow, that he would feel restless and smothered. But they creep towards each other like vines in their sleep, seeking touch and reassurance in the other’s presence. And when he wakes that first morning to the feel of Tonks curled around him in sleep, face pressed to the hollow of his shoulder blades. He knows he does not want to go another night alone ever again.

+

Remus has buried almost everyone that has ever meant anything to him. This is what rattles around in his head as he stares out at the gleaming white tomb of last truly great wizard ever to live. His mother, his best friends and now the man he’d love like a mentor, his greatest saviour maybe, apart from Tonks. Every good thing in his life he owed to Dumbledore in one way or another— education, employment, friends, love— all forged through Dumbledore seeing the man Remus could become. He will never be able to repay him. He can only hope to live the rest of his life in a way that would make Dumbledore proud. 

The mingling sounds of Fawkes lament and the mournful song from the depth of the lake send a chill down his spine. It is a sound that will haunt him forever. 

He also watches Harry, a boy who now holds the weight of the world on his back like the eternally damned Atlas. Harry who’s had another paternal figure, murdered in front of him for the second year in a row. It is too much for anyone to bear, yet he sits there stoically still. What can Remus do, what can any of them do for this poor boy, who is both a child and a man? This boy with his mother’s eyes and an entrenched sense of kindness, and his father’s unwavering belief in what is right and what is wrong. He’s loved Harry from the first moment he’d met him, loved him as close as he will ever get to a child of his own. And now he must watch him walk into a battle he should never have had to be apart of. 

When the ceremony ends, he watches the attendees gather themselves, Minerva leading a procession back to the castle, and his eyes linger on Molly and Arthur, a few rows in front of them. He watches the quiet, unassuming comfort they give each other. Steadfast love and support as Arthur helps his wife from her chair with a gentle rub to her back and her watery ' _thank you love'_. It is a love he’d grown up with, his parents’ devotion not only to him but to each other as well, through thick and overwhelming thin. James had died for Lily and Harry, placed his body like a shield to protect them, knowing he would not win. 

Tonks clutches his hand tightly, her vivid pink hair glowing in the sunshine like a talisman, a reminder that in death springs new life. She presses a kiss to his shoulder, and he is so full of love for her he feels it will overflow, spilling out through the tips of his fingers to his toes.

“Marry me,” he says, the words surprising him and much as they do her. 

“What?” She gapes at him, her eyes red and glassy from the tears she’s shed. 

“Marry me, Dora,” he says again, cradling her hands in his and pressing them to his chest. His life has been marked by rejection for so long now, a universal hand to smack him down each time he dares to hope, that it seems surreal to still be reaching out for something. But he wants to, for her, he wants to. How can he not be willing to try when she gives him everything. If the walls are closing in around them all, he wants to live recklessly, selfishly, without regrets before he dies. 

Her eyes flit around his face, looking for something— madness, sincerity, he doesn’t know what. But then she smiles, a grin so brilliant it could blot out the sun. 

“Yes,” her voice is sure and steady, and it is the sweetest word he’s ever heard.


End file.
